Should Connecticut Schools Require Active Shooter Drills?

(TNS) — Many school leaders in the U.S. understand that, in a time when the country did not go days into the school year without a school shooting, they need to prepare for the worst. That fear and sense of responsibility is particularly magnified in states that have suffered their own tragedies as conversations surrounding school safety in Connecticut are irrevocably stained by the shadow of the fatal shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012.

“I think that, especially in Connecticut, where this was felt so deeply,” said Democratic state Rep. Jeff Currey, co-chairman of the legislature’s Education Committee, “it provides a different lens to the conversation.”

But as schools fortify their buildings and train students and staff for a worst case scenario, concerns have emerged surrounding just how much damage this preparation is causing on its own, and how schools can balance the need to be ready for violence, while limiting unnecessary trauma.

Legislators, anti-gun violence advocacy organizations, mental health experts and parents in states such as Connecticut have recently pushed to change the laws surrounding active shooter and crisis drills, saying that the impact that practicing for these scenarios has on schoolchildren poses a different kind of danger: mentally and emotionally.

A GRAY AREA

Most states require schools to undergo active shooter-related drills.

“Unfortunately, active shooter drills are a part of our society now,” said Eric Elias , president of the Connecticut Association of School Psychologists.

But the requirements in Connecticut in particular aren’t that black and white. Active shooter drills are not technically mandated by the state, and yet, schools were certainly conducting them, said Paula Gill Lopez, psychology professor at Fairfield University and founding member of the Connecticut Center for School Safety and Crisis Preparation.

She describes the legislation surrounding active shooter drills as “loosey goosey.”

State law requires schools to hold seven fire drills and three crisis response drills every year. But it doesn’t go much further than that in terms of specifics, Gill Lopez said.

Generally, crisis drills can include lockdown, shelter in place, secure school, bus evacuation, said state Department of Emergency Management and Homeland Security School Safety Lead Bill Turley. The three crisis drills could be different at every school, as districts have the discretion to choose which ones they participate in.

Active shooter drills and simulations are not explicitly included in legislation, and the state DEMHS does not regulate or require active shooter drills either. That allows a lot of flexibility for schools, crisis experts say.

Because of the vague law and no explicit active shooter drill requirements, right now, every district was doing their drills differently, said Trent Harrison, president of the Newtown Federation of Teachers and teacher at Newtown High School.

At his school, for example, their lockdown drill didn’t mean students had to barricade their doors and huddle or build forts in the corner, he said, which could be the case at other schools.

There’s also a stark difference between an “active shooter simulation,” and what schools refer to as an “active shooter drill” or “lockdown drill,” Harrison noted.

In the less common active shooter simulations, police departments essentially mimic a real-life active shooter scenario inside a school, with fake weapons and ammunition. Many stakeholders in Connecticut agree that those were unnecessarily traumatic, Harrison said.

Lockdown drills are schools’ versions of active shooter drills, wrote a spokesperson from the state DEMHS. Lockdowns typically consist of locking all doors, staying quiet and away from window view, and used when an imminent, clear and present danger poses a risk to students and staff, like an active shooter.

Connecticut schools typically use that type of active shooter drill, said Amery Bernhardt, director of the Connecticut Center for School Safety and Crisis Preparation.

The lack of detailed, consistent language for districts to go off of, in addition to discussions surrounding mental health impacts, have played a big part in the push for new legislation.

WEIGHING CRISIS PREPARATION AND UNNECESSARY TRAUMA

For Currey, and several other experts, the way forward was a matter of “finding that balancing act,” he said.

Many mental health and crisis experts in the state say they support a middle ground approach to active shooter drills that ensures both emergency preparation and the well-being of students and staff.

“We’re not looking to not be prepared for emergency,” Bernhardt said. “We’re also not looking to cause harm while we prepare for emergency.”

But it’s not easy to juggle the perception of safety in schools with being ready in a crisis, Bernhardt said, especially when the crisis is as horrific as a school shooting.

“You never want to heighten the trauma or the safety concerns of anyone involved when you’re doing a drill,” said Gill Lopez. She added that in many cases, depending on the type of active shooter drill, they did exactly that.

“Everyone put in practices to keep children safe, especially after the unimaginable tragedy that happened in Sandy Hook. And it’s coming from a good place … but we can do better,” said state Rep. Jennifer Leeper, D-Fairfield, who led an ultimately unsuccessful push in the legislature last year to change the laws for drills in schools. “We are essentially making our kids feel like an active shooter in their school is a high probability event. Every time we do these drills, it reminds them of that.”

Leeper’s proposal aimed to reduce the minimum required number of crisis response drills to two, with one of the two drills being for staff only, and included banning active-shooter simulations.

“They are making our children much more anxious and instilling the fear in them that school shootings are an inevitability,” she said. “When we know that while they are horrific and far too common than they should be, actually, statistically, are very rare.”

But her bill did not come without resistance, much of which she said was from Newtown-area officials.

“That has probably been the hardest part about having these conversations,” Currey said. “We all are still feeling and working through that trauma.”

Newtown Police Chief David Kullgren, who responded to the Sandy Hook shooting, wrote in his testimony opposing the legislation that he saw firsthand how important the lockdown drills the students and teachers had been practicing were.

“Any restriction on training will reduce the likelihood of the survival of our staff and students,” he wrote.

Republican state Rep. Mitch Bolinsky of Newtown also opposed the legislation. “No community in Connecticut has more practical knowledge, real-world experience, and wisdom in development of best practices,” he wrote in his testimony.

For Harrison, getting rid of crisis preparation drills was not the solution.

“[Students] actually feel safer with the drills because they know these practices are in place,” he said.

Crisis drills allowed students to be exposed to emergency protocol in a controlled, safe environment, Harrison said. “When something happens, seconds matter,” he said. “They do need to know: this is the terminology, this is what happens.”

A NEW WAY FORWARD

Although Leeper’s legislation had failed, it brought to light a conversation that many other states are having surrounding the efficacy and best practices for such drills, and one that Connecticut will continue to have in the upcoming legislative session.

Currently, a working group is developing new legislation, with school resource officers, educators, mental health professionals, legislators, and school safety and crisis preparation experts, Leeper said.

Stakeholders across the board, including Newtown officials, wanted more specific, consistent requirements and language for crisis drills, she said, and expected that to be part of the new proposal. Many experts expressed support for a trauma-informed approach to active shooter drills, helping students feel not only physically safe, but also psychologically safe.

Harrison, who is also working with Leeper on the new legislation, said he hoped districts could look to Newtown as a model for crisis plans and procedures.

“And yes, we put a lot of time and effort into it, because of what happened in town,” he said. But their efforts have paid off, he said, as there wasn’t a single student or parent he knew of that was against or negatively impacted by their comprehensive crisis drills and emergency preparedness practices.

“Their parents drop those kids off every day, knowing that we are going to keep them safe,” Harrison said. “We need to make sure that everybody knows how to be safe.”

Right now, the working group was narrowing down what exactly best practices for school safety should look like, and come January, would bring a proposal to the legislature that they were confident everyone could get behind, said Gill Lopez, who is also a member.

“I think everyone shares the same goal, which is to ensure that our children are safe at school, and having the lens a little broader than just crisis response, but our overall well-being in school is part of what we’re trying to add to that conversation,” Leeper said.

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